Biggest of All - Land's Titan, the Elephant!

It's Big! It's Intelligent! It's Strong!! It's the Giant, the Elephant!

Domestication of Asian elephants had started since 5000 years ago, that's 3000 B.C.!!
While for the African elephants, they stay in the wild and are never domesticated (yet), as far as I know. >.>



So, what's the difference between Asian and African elephants?

Alright, for Asian elephants (or Indian elephants), they are much smaller compare to the African. They have smaller size, in general. Smaller ears, smaller body size, smaller... everything!
As for the tusks, in the African elephants both male and female have the tusks.
For the Asian cousin, only the male has the tusks. Yet some of the male doesn't have any. >.> Weird~


The African Elephants! Big eh? O.O

Asian Elephants! Cute. :O


Hrmm, what symbolizes the elephants? The tusks or the trunk? I'd say both. :O
Wait, the large ears! >.>


Elephants trunk is a very distinctive bio-mechanical structure, where it's a joint upper lip together with the nose. Over hundreds of muscles, controlling the trunk in any direction with strong yet flexible movement. They use it to grab vegetations on the ground, or up high on the trees and feed it. And it also acts as a suction device for elephants to suck water, up to 2 gallons per suction. That's 7 liters of waters! O.O!

Elephants are also used for labor works, for example carrying lumber. This culture is generally for the Asian elephants. In the past, wild elephants around the age of 5, were caught and trained to obey the commands of human. Tied to a rope, continuous beating on the elephants, are to break their spirit and become obedient to human. After that, an elephant would need 10 years or more to be trained. Yet some are not train to do chores. Some of them are trained for entertainment! Yup, those in the circus~


While for the large ears, what are they for? Well as you know (or u might not know), elephants don't sweat. They have a hard time dissipating their body heat under the scorched sun. Those large ears are not to flap to cool their body! The large ears containing great amount of blood vessels, that would allow heat to escape into the air by the flapping motion. Yes they dissipate heat through their EARS. O.O


The elephants play in the mud, not just to PLAY. It's for them to coat themselves with a layer of mud to protect their skin. Elephants calves learn this technique from their parents, which are then pass down generation to generation.


Oldest elephant ever recorded is 82 years old! (Believed to be an Asian elephant)


Population for elephants in the 1930's are recorded as over 10 million units! As for now less than 700 thousand seen across the land. That's a dramatic drop! This is all caused by the illegal trading of the ivory. Tusks obtained from the elephants are traded (through black market) and are carved and sold to the collectors!
WARNING: The amount of elephants are dropping 8% annually!


Love! Peace y'all!

P/S: Oh ya, elephants don't drink with their nose (trunk). They drink with their mouth, just like you! -.-


Credits:-
Google image.
Bing image.
National Geographic's picture.
And Fellow friends :)